School photos - Daylight robbery

We have every school photo that my son has ever had taken, and they are all boring 'bust' shots (except the 'class of' shot ), with a similar boring background ( plain colours), and look totally forced. We have much better photos, taken by ourselves and others that put them to shame. And most were taken with cheapo cameras or phones.

If I am going to part with £30 -£40 for a set of 3 photographs, then I at least expect them to be of high quality, most of the time they are not. Good lighting will not always make a good photo.

 

Actually, one thing I'll miss about teaching is going down the queue of kids waiting for their turn in front of the camera, folding down collars, tucking shirts in, doing up buttons, smoothing down fringes and wiping off any obvious smears. Obviously wasted, all wasted!

 

Everybody else was wearing them as well!

 

After doing our very own Steve Randels course on here I now consider myself a PHOTOGRAPHER
Anything I take is far better than the school offers from a PRO
However I do not get to take full class pix
I still have my full class pics from 1952 to 1962, and look at them with memories. My parents must have paid an unavailable fortune for them at the time, and I thank them for that
(I remember at the time the Provident woman coming every Friday, with the do you want a top up, but at the time I was ignorant of the facts behind all this, We also had the best quality clothes to go back to school each term thanks to the Provident)

Now I look at the great class pictures, but I cry at the 30% interest they were paying to keep my brother and I to save us from embarrassment

The current quality is bad, and the cost ridiculous as it was then !

Though I am glad I have them, Not of myself but Oh that is Paul used to play with him at tea time etc

Jack McH